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“Were you trying to kill yourself, you fucking coward?”
There’s no more bite left to Andrey’s words, only a soft puff of breath that whispers against the bristles that line Goncharov’s mouth: Goncharov caught a glance of Andrey’s expression as the air had been knocked from his chest—an ounce of panic, an ounce of weakness to which the traitor would never admit—but any anger that remained sapped away from Andrey’s body as they lay chest-to-chest, the steam train whirring past their heels like a roaring current. Their breaths had slowed—synched, perhaps distantly longing to be the same entity—but not once had Andrey’s gaze strayed to the piercing stare of the man—only a man, perhaps nothing more—beneath him, fixated stubbornly on the darkness at their side.
“Look me in the eye, and then call me a coward.”
The silence between them grows louder than the train had ever been, crushing in its weight. With little moonlight that trickles between the fluttering leaves above, Goncharov hears more than sees how Andrey grinds his jaw, how his fingers curl around fallen leaves at each side.
Then, a stillness in their breath.
A pause in their time.
And then Andrey is turning his face, the tips of their noses almost brushing, his eyes snapping forward to meet Goncharov at last.
Not even God could stop the grin stretching ear-to-ear across Goncharov’s face.
“What the hell were you thinking?”
They’re still whispering, like there’s a secret hanging in the air. Like there’s someone listening in the lonely woods that surrounds them. There’s something different about Andrey now—loud, spirited Andrey—but then again, Goncharov’s not so sure anymore.
“I was thinking of the train, incoming,” Goncharov tells him, “the pistons pushing the wheels closer, tick tick tick , faster and faster as it approaches. I was thinking of the rumble of the rails beneath my shoes, how they bind you to the track without even a rope. I was thinking about how even if you are surrounded by darkness, knowing your fate is approaching, all you can see is the divine, blinding light.”
Andrey’s face is so close to his, yet his eyes roam every curve and crevice, drinking in every detail like he will find a hidden clue. The autumn wind should pierce his skin—chill him down to the very bone—but something about the night sets Goncharov’s nerves alight, keeps him content to lay forever in this well-nigh grave.
“What a stupid reason to set foot on the tracks,” Andrey’s voice remains soft—too soft for his words—and his eyes narrow around the edges, crinkling with something repressed, “if you’re not going to kill yourself.”
“I knew I would not die: my time has yet to be consumed.” Perhaps it is the rumble of Goncharov’s voice that keeps Andrey bound, sprawled and caging his boss between his limbs, staring into a blinding gaze. “You would come save me because you still need me.”
Andrey’s lips twitch, but he doesn’t deny the statement. “And what if you’re wrong? What if I didn’t need you?”
“I’d rather die than be wrong.”
With a heaving sigh, Andrey falls forward, forehead just brushing alongside Goncharov’s cheek to rest against his shoulder instead. His breath is only evident in the way his chest expands against Goncharov. Closing his eyes to the darkness, Goncharov finds that he itches for a drink, itches for a smoke, until realizing that perhaps he is merely itching for the feel of something against his lips.
Andrey has yet to move, so move neither will Goncharov.
“This shouldn’t be happening.” Andrey’s voice is muffled into Goncharov’s jacket. “It should not have happened like this. There should’ve never been a train.”
“Who are you to claim what is and is not real?”
Andrey is still for a moment, pondering. “Are you suggesting we can pretend this is not real? This never happened?”
But which betrayal? Which memory shall we choose to forget?
“It will become real if you choose to believe it is,” Goncharov decides, holding onto his own truth. “Then this—” this suspended thread in their fates, this sacred moment in time, this secret shared between only them, “—will become just as real to everyone else as it is to us. It is all a matter of mind.”
Precious is the moment not doomed to last, that will fall apart to dust with nothing more than a touch, for all we can do to preserve its beauty is to remember it with all our might, and to linger with false hope that we’ll feel that warmth again.